


Nights Like This

by joycometh



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, POV Buffy Summers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-13
Updated: 2018-10-13
Packaged: 2019-08-01 12:10:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16284374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joycometh/pseuds/joycometh
Summary: This only works because of who and what he is. Of course, so do we.





	Nights Like This

I paint myself in scents the way other women use makeup.

Spike is waiting in the bedroom. I told him to be naked when I got back. He’s never disobeyed that particular command. And he does love it when I do this for him.

It feels so good, so right, to have something special, something that's ours.

Spike and I started out hot and heavy and dangerous, and the sex was dark and risky. We’ve mellowed, and that’s good. But I worry sometimes. I can’t help it. I worry mellow isn’t enough for a vampire.

Because that’s what he is, and I love him. I love a vampire. I spent so long insisting I didn’t love the vampire parts of him, and there are certainly bits I don’t love. I wish I loved all of him, unconditionally, the way he does me. But I can’t. I just can’t.

He doesn’t unleash his demon’s face in bed. He never has, even when we were playing dangerous games together. I don’t know if he even wants to. Or if he wants to too much.

I’m glad, though. The demon’s face still makes me cringe, makes me remember some of the worst of us. Makes me remember that I’ve chosen for my lover a bona fide serial killer. Even reformed, even repentant, those deaths can never be undone. I carry them alongside him.

But the fangs and ridges aren’t the only thing that makes him a vampire.

I survey the perfume bottles in front of me, with a couple of little lotion bottles mixed in for stronger scents. I start on the inside of my wrist, because he will too, and I choose something dark and sharp. I trail it down towards the inside of my elbow, where I switch to a more floral scent. I dribble that up my shoulder and down to my breast, swirling around it with gentle citrus, orange with a heavy dose of vanilla. Spike likes the dark scents best, but I still have enough California girl in me to want the bright touch of citrus somewhere. My nipples are already hard under my fingers as I prepare myself, from my own touch and from Spike’s to come.

I continue across my body, bolder with myself than I would have ever imagined in my younger days. I have Spike to thank for that. A different scent for my navel, then down around the outside of my left hip, laying down the path for Spike to take. I hitch my leg up on the counter and spray something spicy on the back of my knee. It’s cold and feels odd.

Sometimes in my head I call this scratch-n-sniff Buffy. I’ve never shared that joke with Spike, though. When we get going, it’s too beautiful to make fun of.

He gets it. He gets that this only works because he is a vampire, and that I know it and want it. Want him, all of him. I shiver, the heat that’s growing in my belly making my exposed skin feel too tight. I know how this will go, the sensual drag of the tip of his nose as it trails over my skin, stopping to explore each shift and pool of scent, lips caressing right where I tell them to without a single word. I never knew a nose could be sexy before Spike, especially a big one. But it is.

I never perfume between my legs. (Spike would say that area is naturally perfumed. I still think it’s kind of gross, how much he likes my body odors, but I admit it does flatter a girl. Besides, he’ll end there anyway.) I drag my fingers up the inside of my thighs, letting whatever scents remain on my hands point the way to his final destination.

When I’m done I smell nice to me—I am wearing a bit more perfume than usual—but not particularly strong or distinctive. This only works because of who and what he is.

Of course, so do we.

I give myself a final once-over in the mirror, tousling up my hair a bit. It doesn’t really matter. Spike would bed me looking like trash (and has, as a matter of fact). But I know he takes an objective pleasure in beauty, in touch, in taste, in sound, in all the charms of a world that has managed to captivate him for more than a century.

He knows what I’m doing in here. He knows there won’t be any words when I come out of the bathroom. I’ll just go to him, to our bed, crawl over him and kiss him, and then lay down and let him make love to me. Let him explore me. Let him take all the time he wants.

I don’t do this often. It wouldn’t be so special if I did. But I’m glad I’ve found something to offer him, something in the world of sex that I came up with for us to do together. He’s usually one step ahead of me on this stuff.

Obviously he loves having the sex. But what I think he loves most is that when I do this, when I purchase the perfume and plan the path and stand in this bathroom preparing myself, then he knows I’m making the choice to love him. It’s not just hormones, or animal attraction, or girlfriend-ly obligation.

I make a choice. To love him. To pleasure him. To treasure him.

And I do.

More than I can say.

So I’m glad, on nights like this, that I don’t need words.

I push open the door.


End file.
